Gnocchi

Gnocchi is my favourite kind of pasta ♥︎ They sold it at our high school’s cafeteria (my high school was pretty Italian—heck, it was even named after an Italian, Giovanni Caboto or John Cabot), so I was aware (and fond) of it early on (because how can you not be fond of potatoes??). It wasn’t until after university, though, that I started seeing more hype about it. That was probably also around the time I had my first taste of non-high-school-cafeteria gnocchi, and yes, pillowy is exactly the word to describe its soft, light texture. Fried with butter and sage, tossed in a tomato- or cream-based sauce, crisped with bacon-y bits: gnocchi tasted great to me in any kind of dressing, and my only complaint about it was that they never served enough of it at restaurants. Thankfully, I learned last week that gnocchi is pretty doable at home—requires few ingredients, hard to mess up (I had uncooked potato chunks in my dough LOL and it turned out fine), and easy to freeze for later. It just takes a bit of time and manpower (if you don’t have a potato ricer lol).

(original recipe from Fine Cooking)

Note to myself:

• Ingredients:
• 4 large-ish Russet potatoes (roughly the same size)
• 1-½ cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp kosher salt
• 1 egg
• Don’t overboil the potatoes! Put in ice water after boiling to help with peeling skin; do not cut in pieces before boiling.
• Mix flour/salt in first, then mix in egg
• Dressing used here: bacon (cut into lardons), garlic, sliced mushrooms, pesto, parmesan cheese, fresh arugula on top.
• Set aside 2-2.5 hours to make, if you’re slow at cooking like me :)